Canterbury, Kent · Kent

Simon Langton Girls' Grammar School

No score-banded priority tier, no radius, unlike its similarly-named neighbour — Kent County Council runs its admissions on the standard distance-only model.

Despite sharing a founder's name with Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys, this is a legally separate school with a different admissions authority: as a Voluntary Controlled school, Kent County Council itself sets the criteria, not the school's own governors. That shows in the policy itself — no score-banded priority tier, no defined radius, just the standard Kent County Council model of ranking qualified applicants by care status, siblings, health need, Pupil Premium, then straight-line distance. This is a real structural contrast with the Boys' school, whose governing body reserves priority places for boys scoring 20+ marks above the pass mark within 9 miles.

Key facts

Gender: girls
Age range: 11-18
Region: South East
Local authority: Kent
DfE URN: 118840
Website: https://www.langton.kent.sch.uk

Admissions

Admissions authority: Local-authority coordinated test
Entrance test board: The Kent Test, part of Kent County Council's Procedure for Entrance to Secondary Education (PESE). GL Assessment is widely and consistently reported as the paper-setter, corroborated by GL Assessment's own published case study on the Kent process, but not named on KCC's current official Kent Test pages.partly verified
GL Assessment is corroborated by its own published case study on the Kent process and consistently repeated across independent tuition sites, but not named on KCC's current official Kent Test pages.
Test format: Paper 1 combines English and Maths (1 hour total). Paper 2 covers Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning (about 1 hour). Both are multiple-choice and computer-marked. A separate unmarked 40-minute writing exercise is also sat, usable only as supporting evidence at headteacher-panel or appeal stage.
Qualifying / pass mark: The standard Kent-wide grammar threshold (2025 cycle: aggregate 332, no component below 108). The school sets no higher requirement of its own for the normal Year 7 round — its PAN is 165, and among Kent-qualified applicants, places go by non-score-based priority criteria, not by ranking test scores further. A separate school-run 'Progress Test' exists only for late arrivals to Kent after the main Kent Test window closes, requiring an aggregate of 330 with no component below 110 — a distinct alternative-route threshold, not the main-round bar.
Superselective?: No

Catchment & priority criteria

No defined catchment area or priority zone. After care/sibling/health/Pupil-Premium priorities, remaining places among Kent-qualified applicants go purely by straight-line distance from home to school, nearest first.

Children with an EHCP naming the school
Looked-after and previously looked-after children
Current Family Association — a sibling on roll at the time of entry
Health and Special Access Reasons — documented, significant medical or social need specific to this school
Children in receipt of Pupil Premium, via a supplementary form due by 31 October
Nearness of home to school, by straight-line distance
Tie-break for the last place: independently-supervised random allocation

Results

Year	Attainment 8	GCSE 5+ Eng & Maths	Progress 8	A*–A	A*–B
2025	67.6 (national state-funded average 45.9)	89% (national 45%)	Not published — the school's own results document lists Progress 8 as 'n/a' for this cohort, consistent with the nationwide COVID-era gap (this cohort's KS2 SATs, due 2021, were disrupted)	—	—
168 GCSE candidates, 1,534 subject entries. 56% of entries graded 9-7 (national 22%); 98% graded 9-4 (national 68%). EBacc entry 48% (national 41%).
2024	66.9 (national 45.9)	90% (national 46%)	Not published — 'n/a' per the school's own results document, same nationwide COVID-era baseline gap. The last cohort with a real figure was 2023: +0.49 ('Above average', national -0.03).	30% (national 28%)	60% (national 54%)
EBacc entry 44% (national 40%).

Ofsted

Rating: Good — an ungraded Section 8 inspection carried forward the Good grade originally set at a full inspection in July 2014; the 2023 report notes evidence suggested the school might now meet the Outstanding standard, though no full graded Section 5 inspection has been carried out to confirm that.
Date: 26-27 September 2023
Report: Read the full report

Sources

1. DfE Get Information About Schools — URN, status, gender, LA — https://get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/Establishments/Establishment/Details/118840
2. Kent County Council — Secondary Determined Admissions Arrangements for Community & VC Schools 2027/28 (PAN 165, full oversubscription criteria) — https://www.kent.gov.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0017/235700/Secondary-Determined-Arrangements-for-2027-to-2028.pdf
3. Kent County Council — Kent Test results page (2025 qualifying threshold: 332, no component below 108) — https://www.kent.gov.uk/education-and-children/schools/school-places/kent-test/kent-test-results
4. GL Assessment case study on Kent's secondary selection test process — https://www.gl-assessment.co.uk/media/2624/kent-county-council-case-study.pdf
5. Ofsted report, inspected 26-27 September 2023 — https://files.ofsted.gov.uk/v1/file/50232415
6. School's own Year 11 GCSE 2025 results summary (3-year comparison) — https://simon-langton.reactfiles.co.uk/uploads/document/Website-and-Open-Evening-Results-Summaries-2025-with-3-yr-comparisons-2.pdf
7. School's own Year 13 A-level 2024/2025 results summaries — https://simon-langton.reactfiles.co.uk/uploads/document/Website-and-Open-Evening-Results-Summaries-2025-with-3-yr-comparisons-1.pdf
8. DfE Compare School Performance — https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/118840/simon-langton-girls--grammar-school
9. Contrast: Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys admissions criteria 2026/27 (a separate school, score-banded model) — https://www.kent.gov.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/199432/Simon-Langton-Grammar-School-for-Boys-admissions-criteria-2026-2027.pdf

Last updated 2026-08-30. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.